


I Am What I See Inside Of You

by sweetNsimple



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Autistic Will Graham, Canon Autistic Character, Dark Will Graham, Episode AU: s03e07 Digestivo, Episode: s03e07 Digestivo, Hannibal Lecter Loves Will Graham, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Marking, Murder, Murder Husbands, Never forget Abigail Hobbs, Sassy Will Graham, Will Graham Loves Hannibal Lecter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-23
Updated: 2018-06-23
Packaged: 2019-05-27 04:46:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,146
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15016955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sweetNsimple/pseuds/sweetNsimple
Summary: Hannibal leaned back and looked out the window.  “Do we talk about teacups and time and the rules of disorder?”  He glanced at Will.Will held his hands in his lap.  “The teacup’s broken,” he rasped.  Will almost said, It’s never going to gather itself back together again.  He almost asked, Why did you save me?  He almost said, I’m not going to miss you.  He said, “What can you do to fix it again?  There is no Abigail Hobbs to bring back from the dead, Hannibal.  What could you give me now?”





	I Am What I See Inside Of You

_‘He’s going to eat Hannibal… with my face…’_   Thoughts were difficult to catch and hold onto.  Stringing together words and making sense of them required more effort than Will felt they ever had before – even when his brain had caught on fire with encephalitis.  Strapped down and captive in his chair, he still was unsteady, weaving if only in his mind, ready to tip over at any moment. 

_‘With my face…’_ Will might not have looked in a mirror yet, but he knew his face was a mess of cuts and bruises.  It was damaged.  Mason might actually have to practice some patience and wait for Will’s face to repair itself as best as it could and Mason had to know that.  After all, he had just told Cordell to put some lotion on Will’s face – _it’s looking dry_ – so Mason must want Will’s face to look less like death before he put it on.  _Like a person suit_ , Will thought distantly.

Cordell knew how he was going to serve Hannibal up.  He knew, essentially, how he was going to kill Hannibal, body part by body part.  Something wriggled and twisted in Will’s chest.  Something possessive and dark and – _‘I don’t want to acknowledge it’._

Something like Hannibal’s voice whispered back to him, _But you must, if you want to better understand yourself._

He answered back to the enemy inside of him, _‘It would be righteous, for Hannibal to be devoured by one of his patients.  It would be justice.’_

And yet, Will’s insides slithered.  Coiled.  Hannibal did not belong to Mason. 

“Cordell is going to keep you alive for a very long time,” Mason drawled, just as Cordell came too close to Will.

The world wasn’t steady in Will’s eyes.  He missed Cordell’s throat and ended up tearing into his cheek instead.

Hannibal looked at Will with pride, lips quirked up.  He must not have been able to read Will’s disappointment in himself.  If Cordell was dead, Mason would have had to look for a new butcher.

~::~

Cordell’s scalpel cut into Will’s face and Will thought, _‘Damn it’_ , and his breathing was harsh and he was fighting back in his mind, but his body refused to move.  It stung.  He felt the trickle of blood down his face.  It _burned_. 

He couldn’t move.

But he could see.

Cordell only managed the small, deep cut before Hannibal was there.  Hannibal ripped Cordell away from Will before setting into Cordell with a hammer of all things, the sharp pronged end tearing at Cordell’s chest and abdomen.  Cordell _screamed_ and Will – Will felt _excited_.  He felt _protected_. 

He felt _proud_.

The creature in the back of his head, the one Hannibal had nurtured that time ago in therapy when he had let Will _burn_ , had destroyed Will and his relationships, bared sharp fangs and watched with hungry eyes.  It said _Hannibal_ , it said _Mine_ , it said _Mate_.

Breathing became easier as Hannibal tore into Cordell’s arms and legs, shearing them from Cordell’s torso with none of his Chesapeake Ripper finesse, the butcher still alive.  Cordell was sobbing, screaming, choking on his tongue and blood.  Hannibal, almost _vindictively_ , brought the blunt side of the hammer down on Cordell’s genitals.

_‘We do this,’_ Will thought.  _‘Over and over again, we are the death and life of each other.’_   Hadn’t he manipulated Alana Bloom not too long ago into letting Hannibal free of Mason?  Hadn’t he told her that she would have to spill blood, either by her own hand or… by someone else’s?  Back and forth, he and Hannibal went, possessive of the other’s life and when to end it. 

Will relaxed into the table, eyes at half mast, almost slipping into unconsciousness as Hannibal retrieved Cordell’s scalpel and carefully cut into the man’s face.  Cordell had lost too much blood to fight back, gasping in heavy, short breaths, eyes staring straight up.  He barely reacted as his face was peeled away.

Hannibal looked up, just once, eyes searching for Will.  Will stared back. 

The something hungry and foul in Will was mirrored in Hannibal.  The beast in Hannibal was older, far more experienced, and so very compatible to the monster in Will. 

_‘This is how it always will be,’_ Will realized tiredly.  _‘I can never be how I was.  I can never hate him.  I can never be rid of him.  We are a part of each other, him and I.  He fostered codependence so long ago, and we never could be alone again after.’_

He thought that may have been why it had been so easy to find Hannibal in all of Europe.  Hannibal had not survived undiscovered in America for two decades, just to slip up in a few months across the ocean.  Going back to where he had already been under investigation, reckless with his kills? 

Perhaps Hannibal had meant to destroy and rebuild Will into something other, but he had forgotten to separate himself from Will’s foundation.  He was a part of every fractured piece of Will, and Will was a part of Hannibal. 

Will was awake long enough to see Cordell’s face, undamaged by Hannibal’s rampage, come cleanly off of Cordell’s skull.  Will was almost impressed by how clean it was, how it looked like a real mask.  _A person mask_.

_A person suit_.

He slipped away into unconsciousness before he could see what Hannibal did with it.  He knew Hannibal well enough, however, to suppose that Mason Verger would get his new face after all.

~::~

He woke up in a very unexpected place, somewhere he had not been in months.

_Home_.

Or was it? 

He looked around and it was familiar.  There was the window Randall Tier had crashed through.  This was the bed where he had woken up drenched after psyche-shattering nightmares.  There, through the doorway, into the kitchen, was where he had thrown up Abigail Hobbs’ ear into the sink.  On the steps outside the front door, he had waited for Hannibal to come to him, to help him, when he had not known what to do after Abigail’s disappearance and his lost time.

He had been so gullible, so _naïve_ to the devil he had all but invited into his bed.

_‘Bring him to bed,’_ said the monster in him, that he was becoming, that he _would_ become if he was not oh-so careful and cautious.  _‘Invite him.  Give in.’_

It would be so easy, wouldn’t it?

_‘Not possible,’_ he thought.  Hannibal was gone.  It would be the smart thing to do.  He could disappear again, for real.  Go somewhere new where he had never been before and create a new, respectable identity.

_‘You know that’s not true,’_ whispered the enemy, and it was right.

Hannibal was still here.

As if called by Will’s wakefulness, Hannibal promptly came through the front door as Will was sitting up in bed.

Hannibal, without a word, quietly closed the front door, as if Will still slept.  His footsteps did not make a sound as he approached and picked up a notebook at the edge of the mattress.  There were numerous equations, at least two pages of them from Will could see.  Or just one very long equation.  Hannibal sat down in a chair that had been pulled up to the corner of the bed.  Will wondered how long Hannibal had watched him as Will had slept, if Hannibal had slept himself.  Hannibal looked clean and well dressed, different from the blood spattered fiend that had saved Will some time ago – hours ago?  Days ago?  Will didn’t know.  And yet, Hannibal’s exhaustion was a physical presence.

Hannibal leaned back and looked out the window.  “Do we talk about teacups and time and the rules of disorder?”  He glanced at Will.

Will held his hands in his lap.  “The teacup’s broken,” he rasped.  His throat hurt.  His head hurt.  Everything hurt. 

He opened his mouth to continue, to say more, to say how he never wanted to see Hannibal again, how he would never look for Hannibal again –

And the monster inside of him smiled, all teeth bared, and whispered, _‘Liar’_.  Will would think about Hannibal every day.  He would think of Hannibal possessive of Will, think of Hannibal protective of Will, think of Hannibal now as he was, haggard looking even when well put together. 

Will almost said, _It’s never going to gather itself back together again_.  He almost asked, _Why did you save me?_ He almost said, _I’m not going to miss you_.

He said, “What can you do to fix it again?  There is no Abigail Hobbs to bring back from the dead, Hannibal.  What could you give me now?”

Will despised eye contact.  It was distracting.  He could see too much, he could not see enough.  He questioned everything that he saw in another person’s gaze.  It was easy with Hannibal, though, and it had been before and was now.  Hannibal was steady and his eyes were still.  He looked into Hannibal’s maroon gaze and saw himself there, in Hannibal’s thoughts.

“Is there anything you can do to fix the teacup, or will you gut me and leave me alone again, to suffer the repercussions of your actions?”  Will hissed.  The beast in him was hot and growling.  Will was suddenly so _angry_.  “Abigail didn’t have to die.  I called you.  I _chose_ you, in the end, I gave you time to leave and get away safe, but you stayed and you hurt _everyone_ I cared for and you – you killed _Abigail_.”  Breathing hard, almost snarling, Will snapped at Hannibal, “I chose _you_!”  The anger left, taking with it what seemed all his strength.  He sagged into himself and sobbed, “I chose you.”

“You chose me at the last conceivable moment,” Hannibal returned, calm and collected.  “I had given you the opportunity to tell the truth the night before, and yet you rebuked me.”

Will’s stuttering breath paused - and then he laughed, terrible and humorless, “And you _–_ you left me… with a _smile_.” 

Hannibal nodded.  “I saw the scar as I was caring for you,” he admitted, which explained why Will was in different clothes and cleaner than he expected to be.  “The surgeon charged with your care was subpar, and saying that is even generous.”

“High praise from you,” Will muttered. 

“I did harm you physically, that night – but I made sure that it would not take your life.  Alana, Jack, Abigail – their lives were forfeit.  You, however, the greatest threat to my life and freedom – you, I could not rid myself of.  You had infested me, overcome me.  I felt genuine hurt at your betrayal and sought to betray you in turn.  So I took Abigail away from you, as you had taken yourself away from me.”

“I chose _you_.” 

“And I gave you your life when I could have left you with nothing.”

“You don’t see it, do you?  You still don’t get it.  You _did_ leave me with nothing.  I was a breathing, walking corpse.  I didn’t even begin to feel alive again until Florence.  Not until I investigated the scene of your valentine.”

“It was meant for you,” Hannibal said.  “I knew you would find it.  I knew you would investigate.  I was there, watching you.  When you went into the catacombs, I was there as well.”

“That would not be the first time you have abandoned me, Dr. Lecter,” Will hissed, agitated. 

“Rightly so, I believe, as the next time I saw you, you had conspired to kill me.”

“I had conspired to _change_ you.”

“According to what you said as you were bleeding out on my kitchen floor that long time ago, you had already changed me, as I had changed you.”

Will shrugged, and regretted the painful act.  “You’re still a narcissistic asshole, so more change would have done you good.  Or should I not say things like that?  You have killed for less, I’m sure.” 

“I have,” Hannibal agreed.  He did not rise to smite Will.  “You continue to feel resentment toward me.  Not specifically for Alana or Jack, or even for yourself, but for Abigail.  She was not your daughter, yet you had fostered a familial bond with her and felt responsible for her wellbeing and safety.  When I slit her throat, you crawled on the floor like a dying animal to try and save her life, even with your own injuries.  I revealed her to you, giving you a brief moment of hope that she would stay, before ripping her away from you.”

“She didn’t deserve what you did to her,” Will growled.

“No, she did not, but regret and guilt will not bring her back and I am, as you may have noticed, largely incapable of such emotions, and would not care for them if I was capable.  It is done with.”

“Because you have mote it so,” Will slandered.  “It is done with, so there is no point thinking about it, being _haunted_ by it, wanting something different.”

“Would it help you, to live on false hope and dreams that will never come true?”

“It would make me feel better.”

“No, it would not.  Not at all.”

Will forced stagnant, heavy air from his lungs and turned his head away.  “I can’t believe I’m going with you.  Then again, I did say that I forgive you.  For better or worse, I meant it.”

There was a long, pregnant pause.  “You are coming with me?” Hannibal breathed.  As if he had had doubts.

“I could say no,” Will thought out loud.  “I could say no and, in time, we would come together again anyway.  Weeks, months, or years from now – but we’ll be drawn together again, like magnets.  I could fight it, but I won’t.  I’m tired of fighting you, and you’re tired of fighting me.  Neither of us are victorious, but we can have mercy on one another.”

“But you are victorious.  I find you victorious, in my mind palace.  I cannot get rid of you.  I find that I do not want to get rid of you.  You have bested me.”

“Bested you?”  Will snorted, amused despite himself.  “I couldn’t have.  No one can ever best than the great and powerful Dr. Hannibal Lecter.”

“You can,” Hannibal spoke into the space between them, _worshipful_.  “And you have, for you are just as great and powerful.  Growing still, you will surpass me.  That is all I ever wanted for you.  For both of us.”

“For me to surpass you?”

“Yes.  So that we together can find beauty in the darkness, to languish in the crypts as one.  I want you to unleash your full potential – spread your wings, as it were.”

“Could your pride handle that?”

Something had slipped into Will’s voice, some tone or lilt, some hint of _coy_ , some hint of _just maybe_.  Hannibal heard it and his head tilted just slightly to the side in consideration.  

He put the notebook back on the corner of the bed and stood.  Towered over Will, really.  Will was only slightly shorter than Hannibal, but Hannibal was broad enough to cast Will into darkness.  Hannibal was too practiced at dragging Will from the light.

He took only one step to be at the head of Will’s bed and lean over him.  One hand crept carefully into Will’s hair, careful not to pull at his scalp – how many wounds would break open on Will’s face, if Hannibal tugged just slightly? – and the other balanced Hannibal’s weight over him using the window sill behind Will.

“I would be made prouder, to help you become what you are meant to be and watch you thrive and grow at my side.  As my equal.”

“Not a pig for you to dispose of at the first sign of weakness?”

“You have proven that killing you is near impossible for you – you and fate, it seems.” 

Will was smug to remember that Hannibal had not had time to cut open his skull before the police had arrived.  As Mason had said, Will had been swiped from Hannibal’s very mouth. 

“That amuses you?” Hannibal asked of him.

“Isn’t it as true for you as it is for me?  Matthew almost had you, if not for Jack.”

“And Mason would have had me, if not for Alana.”

Will shook his head.  “No.  Mason would have had you if not for _me_.”

Hannibal paused.  “You spoke to Alana before she came to me.  You convinced her to release me?”

“I told her what she had to do,” Will admitted.  “She chose having you do the dirty work over herself.”  He shrugged, which he instantly regretted with a hiss of pain.

“As you knew she would.”

“I may have had an inkling.”

Hannibal’s hand gently massaged the curve of Will’s skull.  “Is that what this is?  I cannot live with you and I cannot live without you.  My life is only yours to take and no others.”

“Are you saying the reverse isn’t true?  You had no reason to save me from Cordell, and yet here we both are.”

“I made a promise to Alana to save you in return for my freedom.  I keep my promises.” 

“You didn’t have to take me away from Muskrat farm.  You didn’t have to bring me here.  Before, when I was on trial for _your_ crimes – you didn’t have to kill the judge.  You could have had me convicted for Matthew, but you testified for me.  You have played with me, manipulated me, _tortured_ me – but to kill me?  You _thirst_ for me in every way that cannot be quenched by my death.  You were relieved when you didn’t have time to saw my head open, weren’t you?”  A thought occurs and he leans just so into Hannibal.  “You say you promised Alana to save me from Mason – you never promised to would save me from _you_.  Wouldn’t it have been fitting to leave me there, at Muskrat Farm, eviscerated and destroyed by your own hand for Alana to find?”

“Perhaps I was more concerned with other matters.”

“Such as escaping?”  He was feeling playful now.  Testing his claws and fangs, nipping at Hannibal.  “I’m sure that my life was only spared as being a crucial part of your plan.  We’ve escaped, Hannibal.  Instead of being dead, I appear to be…”  He gingerly touched the gauze on his forehead.  “well taken care of.  Watched over.  _Protected_ by you, as if my continued existence to you means more than a convenient source of protein.”

“You tease me,” Hannibal murmured.  “As if you know my mind.”

“As well as you know mine.”

“Do I know your mind, Will?  You continue to surprise me.  I feel that you need me, and yet you continue to push me away.  You place me in danger, only to then save me at cost to yourself.”

“How many men died so that you could save me from Cordell?  How easy was it with your own wounds?  Which was closer: Me or salvation?”

“To me, Will, they are one and the same.”

Will’s breath hitched.  There was so much emotion, too much _admission_ in those words.  He focused on the bob of Hannibal’s throat.  It was closer than it had been.  As they had spoken, Hannibal had been slowly leaning in closer and closer.  Will breathed out and Hannibal breathed him in.  Hannibal breathed out and Will breathed him in.

“Which was closer,” he reworded, “Me or the road out of Muskrat farm?”

“Chiyoh came for me.  Escape was not too difficult.”

Will met Hannibal’s eyes.  “Then maybe Chiyoh should be where you are now.  Did you know that Chiyoh kissed me before she threw me off the train?”  Hannibal’s eyes flashed.  “She kissed me so that she _could_ throw me off the train, but, do you think she would be opposed to kissing me again?  As she is my hero now, apparently, and you, only reluctantly a participant at the behest of another woman I have kissed.”

“This is a dangerous game to play, Will.”

“We’ve played more dangerous before.”

“I have killed for you.”  Hannibal brushed his nose against Will’s temple.  “I have killed because of you.  If I must, I will kill again, and you will be the cause.  I am no reluctant participant.”

“Tell me why, Hannibal.”  When Hannibal’s cheek brushed his, Will leaned into it, nuzzling in return.  “Are you in love with me, Hannibal?  Is that why you have taken everyone else from me, so that I all that I feel is for you, and all that I am is because of you?  Is that why you try to kill me, just to realize that you need me alive?”

“ _Complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind_ ,” Hannibal sighed Phillippians 2:2 against his ear.   “What I feel for you is consuming and destructive.”

Will’s heart was dancing at _having the same love_ , but he managed nonetheless to sass.  “As someone who destroys and consumes a great deal, you must be adjusting well to feeling something for someone other than yourself for once.”  He raised an eyebrow – a bad idea, a _painful_ idea – when Hannibal leaned back to look at him through narrowed eyes.  “I watched you kill Cordell and it… excited me.  Pleased me.  I was glad to have you as, as _mine_ , even though you aren’t.”

“I am,” Hannibal corrected.  “I have been.  The unfortunate reality of our situation is that I may always be.”

“Unfortunate, Hannibal?  Even if what I feel for you is just as consuming and destructive?  You killed Cordell to save me, but I was the one to try to kill him first to save you.”

Hannibal’s eyes drifted, trying to recall the moment.  They snapped back when he remembered.  “When you bit off his cheek.  That is not a critical wound, only disfiguring.”

“Well, given the day I had been having, excuse me if I missed his throat.”

“If Cordell had died then, Mason would have had to find a different butcher.  It would not have taken him long to find someone else to hack off my limbs.”

“It would have to find someone else to do a face transplant.  He wasn’t going to eat you until he was wearing my face.” 

Hannibal traced the curve of Will’s cheek and temple with the tip of his nose, inhaling him.  “It seems you are right, then.  With the bodies we have left behind, it seems as though we do not only consume and destroy one another, but all around us.”

“Like a black hole,” Will compared.

“And like a fire.  Like consuming darkness that breaks the world apart in pieces, and like blistering heat that destroys in agonizing beauty.”

“I want that with you.”  Will focused just past Hannibal’s ear, huffing a pained laugh.  “I want to be with you, wherever you go, and be a part of what you do.”

“Oh, my sweet boy,” Hannibal breathed.  He made enough space to look at Will, into his eyes, as if looking for a lie.  There had been many leading up to this moment. 

Will smiled to himself, eyes on Hannibal’s throat, before daring to lunge for his target.

This time, his aim was true, and his lips fought with Hannibal’s lips.  His hands came up, grabbing the layers of clothes Hannibal wore, pulling at the coat, sweater, and button-up as well as he could. 

Hannibal fell into his mouth, teeth bared, _hungry_.  His hand in Will’s hair moved down to the nape of Will’s neck and pulled him closer.  Hannibal came at Will with the unhidden agenda of _devouring_ him.  He was unwise to Will’s true goal until Will had already pulled and pushed at Hannibal’s clothes enough to accomplish it.

He broke from Hannibal’s lips for a moment – to breathe, to think, to evaluate, as far as Hannibal knew – but it was to dip his head down and bite viciously into the meat of Hannibal’s shoulder and neck.  Blood gushed into Will’s mouth, iron and salty, _warm_.  Hannibal shivered in his hold, breath stuttering, and he still held Will so close. So close, as if Will was precious and this act a declaration of – love?  Lust?  Possession?  Obsession?

_‘Everything,’_ He and the beast whispered.  They were one being.  They were one mind, one heart, one voice.  He was the enemy inside himself.  It had taken so long to come to terms with that.

He pulled back and licked at the blood that flowed sluggishly.  Impatient, Hannibal tilted his head so that he could kiss him once more.  Taste himself on Will’s lips, see the scarlet stain his face, the dark hunger of his light eyes.

Will pushed him back, just for a moment.  “You left your scars on me,” he growled, thinking of the smile Hannibal left him with, the scar that will form on his forehead.  “I leave my scars on you.”  He bared his teeth in the wolfish semblance of joy, bloodstained, thinking of the scars on Hannibal’s inner arms left behind by Matthew Brown at Will’s behest, and now this.  His claiming bite on Hannibal, so deep that Hannibal… might actually want to consider stitches.

“Now we’re even,” Will said.

Hannibal, in his own subtle way, smiled.  “Even Steven,” he repeated from an earlier time.

Will slid down the bed, eyes on Hannibal’s, until he was flat on his back once more.  When he was laid out, he pulled Hannibal onto the bed over him.  Hannibal bled on him, on his blankets, on his pillow.  It had to hurt, especially as Hannibal continued to put weight on it so that he did not fall on Will.  Hannibal showed no pain, only adoration. 

“What will you do,” Will asked as Hannibal slotted their hips together, “to put the teacup back together again, Hannibal?”  This was important.  Their meeting had not derailed, so much as it had led to this moment.

Hannibal did not thrust against him, which was good.  He could feel that neither of them were hard, exhausted and injured as they were.  The heat building in them was teasing, but not flourishing.  If Hannibal was determined to make something of this position, Will might have to go for his throat again. 

Hannibal studied him for long moments before he brought his body slowly, gently, down on Will’s.  He did not put his full weight on Will, but enough for Will to feel the shape of him, the warmth of him, the suggestion of his mass.  His control over his own body, even injured and tired, was absolute. 

“Anything, my dear Will,” he whispered against Will’s cheek, nosing down to his jaw.  Hannibal breathed him in deeply, nuzzling behind his ear and down the junction of his throat.  Will bared his teeth, in case Hannibal planned to bite him in return. 

“Anything?” Will intoned.  “That could be _anything_ , Hannibal.  If I asked you to leave and never come back to me?  If I said that I would never look for you?”

Hannibal blinked slowly, reptilian.  “You said you would come with me.”

“You said anything, _my dear Hannibal_ ,” Will teased.  “I didn’t say it was what I wanted, only that I want to know what you would do if it was.”  

The pause preceding Hannibal’s answer was more than likely the older man trying to understand why he was being asked about a hypothetical situation that was not going to occur.  Instead of rebuking it, he had the wisdom to consider the possibility as if it were actually possible – because Will had asked him to.  Because Hannibal had said _anything_.“I would leave, but I would go somewhere you could always find me for when you have need of me.”

“You would turn yourself in,” Will translated.

“I would turn myself in,” Hannibal agreed.

“So that you could always haunt my thoughts.  So that I would have to convince myself every day for the rest of my life _not_ to go to you.” 

“I would want you to give in eventually, not necessarily sooner or later.  I would be accepting your terms, as I would not be able to come back to you, and you would never have to look for me.”

“You have always been incredible with manipulation and strategy,” Will breathed.  He leaned up, enough to feel pain radiate through his body, but also enough to lick his bite on Hannibal again.  “And when we leave, will you show me all the places you once said you would?  Can I bring my dogs with us?  What if I want children?”

“Do you?  Want all of those things?”

“Maybe not children,” Will said, swallowing thickly.  _Abigail_.  The child he almost had with Margot.  “Not yet.  But my dogs?  I miss them, Hannibal.”  He turned to look at the empty dog beds.  “They have never judged me.  They have always loved and cared for me.  When you took everyone else away, I still had them.”  He looked carefully at Hannibal to make certain the cannibal had no design to kill his dogs.  The Chesapeake Killer had never killed household pets before, but Hannibal Lecter had drowned birds for dessert. 

He had killed children to hurt Will.  And Will’s dogs?  His most beloved children.

Lecter pressed a kiss to Will’s chin, his temple, above each eye.  “We will retrieve them, once we are in a safe location.  All you must do is tell me where they are.”

Will gripped Lecter’s left arm in a strong hold.  “If one of them dies in transit, if one of them is poisoned or goes missing, if one of them is _missing_ anything – I will hold you responsible, Lecter.  And you _will_ become part of my design.”

“What would be your design?” Lecter whispered, lovestruck in a subtle smile and warm eyes.  His weight settled more firmly on Will, arms trembling.  Even his strength was finite. 

“Personal,” Will said against his mouth.  “Intimate.  Slow, like lovemaking.”

“Your dogs will be in good hands,” Hannibal said, not out of fear for his life, but out of a desire for Will.  Just Will.

Hannibal rolled to the side and landed next to Will with an interrupted flinch.  He was slow and careful in lying down on his back, face void of expression.  Will supposed that he must not have left Muskrat farm without his own injuries.  Hannibal’s hand came up and pressed against his newest injury.  There was no rush, as Will perceived, to tend to the bite. 

“If there is anything here that you want to bring with you, I will let Chiyoh know and it will be sent to us.”  Will moved slowly, painfully, so that his head rested on Hannibal’s clean shoulder.  “We should get ready to leave soon.”

“Are you expecting company?” Will asked.  There was no way for anyone to know where they were.

“One can never be too careful.”

“I just want my dogs.”  Will breathed in Hannibal.  “Everything else is replaceable.”

“Then you will have your dogs.”  Hannibal kissed the top of his head, nuzzled his curls.  His heart was slow and steady beneath Will’s ear.  “And everything else will be replaced in time.”

“No reason to wait here then, I guess.”

Hannibal, when Will tipped his face up to look at him, was smiling.  _Fully_ smiling.  He looked happy and soft, as if life was good and nice and full of good and nice things.  “No reason at all,” Hannibal agreed, and ducked his head to kiss him again.  “My dear, lovely Will.”

~::~

_One year later…_

Paris, the city of romance…

And at the steps of the Notre-Dame Cathedral were posed two lovers.  On bent knee, one man offered his heart to his beau, whose chest bloomed with crimson red roses.  She held in turn, her own heart to give.  Their smiles for one another all but overwhelmed their faces, and they, as they say, were “blinded by love”.

It had taken more than one passerby to realize what was horribly, awfully wrong with this scene.

The first person to scream was a full grown man, followed by his small child.  Perhaps, he had come closer to the couple out of curiosity, thinking that they must be staged, like wax models.  There were poles holding both of the lovers in place and the roses were quite literally blooming _in the women’s chest_.  Their faces must not have been completed by the artist who had posed them, the man must have thought.  Though others would wonder why the artist had painted their faces so red.

Although the lovers were staged like puppets and an artist – or two – were involved in creating the display, the two models in question had been very much alive some hours ago.  Their eye sockets had been carved out, their smiles slashed on.  The woman’s chest had been cracked open and her organs removed.  The man’s intestines were hanging out of his belly – “spilling his guts” to his beau – and the hearts they held out to one another were anatomically correct because they just so happened to have once been a part of the couple’s anatomy. 

It was ghastly.  What monsters could have done this?

Some miles away, Hannibal and Will enjoyed the warm, coffee aromas of a sleepy café.  Both had one leg folded over the other as they sat at a window table, gazing out into the street and early dawn.  Will dared to run his foot up Hannibal’s calf and pretend innocence by sipping his coffee and not acknowledging Hannibal’s hungry gaze at all.

“Did you enjoy our wedding present, Will?” Hannibal asked. 

Will smiled and laughed softly.  “I did, actually.  I couldn’t have asked for a better wedding night than uniting another couple in the city of love.” 

“Indeed, a most romantic and selfless sentiment on your part,” Hannibal cheered. 

They smiled secretly at one another.

They thought of Bella Louvré, who had tried to find love in the young boys she babysat.  They _giggled_ , like children, over Gaston DePaul, who tried to find love in the girls he taught in primary school.  Finally, they had found someone to love them unconditionally in death, someone who would understand their design. 

It had been Will’s design to smile and be meek.  To stutter through French and be charming to Bella, who had liked to think she was a good person who would help this poor, lost American man.  As she had led him “home”, he had led her astray.  In darkness, Will took her life – intimately.  With his knife to her throat.  His design was not the same as Hannibal’s, who sought to prolong agony and pain.  In death, Will was benevolent, and gave Bella what she wanted, as he had given Randall what he had always wanted.  Will had already discussed his design with Hannibal, and so Hannibal did not meet him until hours later when he had finished with the body of Gaston.  Together, they posed the couple.  Side by side, sometimes laughing at the absurdity of the display.

Hannibal had taken one of the roses from Bella’s chest and brushed it down Will’s cheek before handing it to him.  Will, flushed, gave Hannibal a kiss in turn. 

_“This is all I ever wanted for you, Will_ ,” Hannibal had said as they had stepped back and studied the scene.  The darkness around them was all encompassing.  The obstacles and construction material they had set up at a good distance around the stairs kept onlookers at a safe enough distance to not realize what exactly they were seeing.  They themselves were dressed in plain jumpsuits, hats pulled on, and Will had taken a dark bb cream to his skin so that he did not glow in the moonlight. 

Will had looked at the macabre couple, blind with love, hearts in hand, and he had smiled.  _“It’s beautiful.”_

Today, they had only eyes for one another. 

There was an undeniable heat in Will’s belly, coiling itself tighter and tighter.  Their celebration had been breathtaking, but time consuming.  They had left the scene only to disappear and change before joining society once more.  Exhausted, Will still felt the need to celebrate their marriage in a more… traditional sense.

He stood, putting change down on the table.  Trailing his fingers from the money to Hannibal, his hand drifted up his arm to his shoulder before pressing between his shoulders.  Will, behind Hannibal now, leaned in and nipped the lobe of his ear.  “We should go home now,” Will whispered.  “I have very pressing matters for you to attend to.”

Hannibal hummed low in his throat.  “Do you?”

“As much as you do for me, yes.”

“Then we should not delay.  Please, my dear, lovely Will.”  Hannibal tilted his head to smile at him.  “Lead the way.”

**Author's Note:**

> There are some episodes of Hannibal that I keep watching, over and over again, and this is one of them. Their minute expressions, how they look to each other, haunts me. I also try to interpret their actions to the best of my ability. I made something of it and gave it the ending I was hoping for. 
> 
> If I am missing any tags, please let me know. Thank you!


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